1st Earl Mountbatten (of Burma), Louis (Francis Albert Victor Nicholas) Mountbatten Biography (1900–79) British Admiral of the Fleet and statesman, born in Windsor, S England, UK, the younger son of Prince Louis of Battenberg and Princess Victoria of Hesse, the granddaughter of Queen Victoria. He trained at Dartmouth, and joined the Royal Navy in 1916. In World War 2 he became chief of Combined Operations Command (1942), and played a key role in preparations for D-Day. In 1943 he was appointed supreme commander in SE Asia, where he defeated the Japanese offensive into India (1944), and worked closely with Slim to reconquer Burma (1945). He received the Japanese surrender at Singapore, and in 1947 was sworn in as last Viceroy of India prior to independence. Created an earl in 1947, he returned to the Admiralty, and became First Sea Lord (1954) and chief of the defence staff (1959). Retiring in 1965, he remained in the public eye, and was assassinated by Irish terrorists while fishing off Mullaghmore near his summer home, Classiebawn Castle, Co Sligo, Ireland.
